I book awards almost on a daily basis and think this year's award for "most obnoxious" award booking experience goes to SQ.

I had pieced together a multi-city, multi-cabin award based on availability shown on the SQ website. Nothing overly complex, SQ metal only.

I spent an amazing four hours on the phone today talking to six different agents, and one was worse than the other.

"There's no availability."
"The availability shown on the website is not accurate."
"The availability shown on the website hasn't been updated."
"You must be looking at availability for paid tickets." (No, I'm not an idiot)

According to the website there are eight flights both with saver and standard award availability, and yet the agents insisted that there was no availability and all they could do is put me on the waitlist.

I was slightly luckier for the longhaul flight. After getting the same story, I asked the agent to please check with their supervisor and suddenly the story changed to "we can confirm the F award seat".

Is this just a matter of incompetent agents or does the SQ website really display such a huge amount of award availability that's actually not bookable?